


Reciprocity

by Sinnatious



Category: Magic Kaito, 名探偵コナン | Detective Conan | Case Closed
Genre: Gen, Identity Issues, Immortality
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-13
Updated: 2019-01-13
Packaged: 2019-10-09 10:42:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,023
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17405432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sinnatious/pseuds/Sinnatious
Summary: Edogawa Conan had just turned 31, and was starting to get worried about Kaitou KID.





	Reciprocity

**Author's Note:**

> Similar sort of theme exploration to my last little one-shot in this fandom, Masks and Faces, but this time focusing on Shinichi and a dash of immortality thrown in. I'm not done playing with identity issues and immortality tropes just yet, I love this stuff.

 

 

Shinichi walked through the pristine glass doors of the Aichi Prefectural Police Headquarters at precisely 9:55am on his day off. Most police stations across Japan followed similar layouts, so it took him only a matter of moments to locate the correct reception desk. “I’m here for a meeting with the Commissioner. I should be expected.”

“Name?” the officer on desk duty asked, eyes half-lidded and evidently on the tail end of an off-hours shift.

“Edogawa Conan,” Shinichi replied.

The officer blinked, and looked at him again. “Oh! You’re that detective – I mean, sorry, sir, I didn’t recognise you.”

“It’s quite alright,” Shinichi promised. “I prefer it that way.”

The officer flushed, evidently flustered, but quickly rallied. “The Commissioner has just finished a meeting, by the time you reach his office he should be ready for you.”

Shinichi thanked him and made his way to the bank of elevators. Luckily, no one else had noticed the exchange and paid him no attention. He didn’t really want the fuss – positive  _or_  negative - he tended to bring in regional stations.

Edogawa Conan was now more famous than Kudo Shinichi had ever been, after all. ‘Shinichi’ had become increasingly who he  _was_ , like a maiden name before marriage, or a nickname left behind only with old acquaintances. He still thought of himself as Shinichi, and his parents still used it in private, but he doubted there were many people left who even thought of his original identity with any regularity. Even Hattori had stopped slipping up.

It had taken years to stop hoping for a cure – and Haibara had humoured him long past the point of reason, and had handled him with uncharacteristic patience when reality finally wore its way in and he grieved for his old life. In the end though, the only truly painful thing about laying ‘Shinichi’ to rest finally had been giving up Ran. His life as Conan, however frustrating as it had been, was so much more vibrant and colourful. Going through high school again was a particular brand of torture, but once he finally passed into his twenties, there was no longer anything he missed. Even Ran, however exquisitely painful that had been, had become nothing more than a fondly remembered childhood love.

Conan was a proper detective now anyway, as he always dreamed. The Karasuma Group defeated, now he chased down the lingering remnants which clung to the shadows – as always with such a mammoth undertaking, some cells, some agents, slipped the net and remain at large. Their power and influence though had become no more heinous than any gang. In-fighting and cross purposes prevented anyone successfully stepping into the power vacuum, and the police and intelligence services did their best to keep it that way.

The elevator arrived at the top floor with a quiet ding. Shinichi stepped out onto the soft, well-worn blue carpets, and made his way to the Commissioner’s office.

“Come in,” a muffled voice answered Shinichi’s confident knock. He swung open the door, stepping in and shutting it lightly behind him.

“Edogawa,” Hakuba greeted.

“Hakuba,” he returned with a slight bow.

Hakuba Saguru was the current Commissioner for Aichi Prefecture – a small town, but nonetheless a prestigious position to hold at his age and clear to everyone that it was merely a brief formality on his way further up the ladder. He’d been forced by his responsibilities to put aside the KID case, but Shinichi knew he maintained an interest in it, even if from afar. Nakamori’s successor had been known to seek his counsel on the matter of KID nearly as frequently as Shinichi himself.

Curiously, KID never seemed to hold heists anywhere near where Hakuba could conceivably attend.

“You’re looking well,” Hakuba said. “Although I’m surprised you’re still a mere detective, honestly. I would have thought you’d be given your own division by now.”

Shinichi flushed. The Shinichi of a different timeline perhaps, one who was still ruled by ego. As Conan, he’d developed different priorities. “They’ve made me a senior,” he admitted. “But I declined further promotions for the time being. I feel like my skills are better used in the field than in management.”

Hakuba’s wry smile showed new wrinkles oh his face – they suited him well, lent his countenance distinction. “I can’t say there aren’t days I wish I made a similar decision. I have discovered that the higher ranks bring less freedom instead of more.” He waved his hand at one of the chairs set against the wall. “Go on, take a seat. No need to stand at attention. You’re here to talk, aren’t you?”

Shinichi gave him a faint smile as he fetched one of the chairs and settled it opposite the desk. “You haven’t let your deductive skills rust at all.”

“Hardly an impressive leap of logic. There’s only one case that would bring Edogawa Conan all the way to Aichi to talk to me in person.”

Shinichi’s smile turned guilty. “I suppose I could have just called, but-”

“In our line of work, being able to see a person’s expressions can be invaluable,” Hakuba agreed easily, and clasped his hands in front of him. “So, Edogawa. Let’s get to the point. You finally noticed.”

The ‘finally’ should have bothered him – might have, once upon a time. But Conan was more reasonable and less ego-driven than Shinichi had ever been, and acknowledged well enough that this case had fallen to the back of his mind behind the never-ending parade of murders and blackmail and suicides and assaults. “You’ve been keeping your thoughts to yourself, and just waiting for someone else to confirm?” he asked.

“It’s an outlandish idea,” Hakuba said. “And in my position, to talk about such things openly, well…”

Shinichi understood. “I wanted to compare notes, to confirm some things. A lot of the information is cold now, and you  _have_  always been one of the foremost experts on Kaitou KID.”

Hakuba gave him a faint smile at that. “High praise from the famous 'KID killer'. By all means. Where did you want to start?”

“The pattern changed, at some point. It was slow, but it changed. And the catalyst – the  _Anesidora_.”

Hakuba nodded in agreement. “The gem that Kaitou KID didn’t return.”

Shinichi would have been twenty-two that year, and set to graduate from University. Conan had been twelve, in middle school, and heavily embroiled in the endgame of bringing the Black Organisation down. He’d missed that particular heist.

Shinichi leaned forward. “So you agree it was on purpose then.”

“On its own, I might have been inclined to believe the gem destroyed by accident in the chase. It was a particularly hectic one, even by KID standards. And he did make reparations.”

It had been a curious case, one which had gripped the media for weeks. KID had made only a short announcement, that the gem was lost, and threw a rather spectacular show for his fans as though in apology. The gem’s owners had received a generous ‘anonymous’ donation of cash, which had apparently been earned through a series of dummy corporations with non-existent CEOs selling KID merchandise.

“Trust KID to fund his exploits by selling merchandise of himself,” Shinichi mused.

“He covers his tracks well when he wants to,” Hakuba grumbled, following his train of thought. “He must have masqueraded at least fifteen distinct false identities to set all that up.”

“I never followed it up,” Shinichi admitted. He’d noticed of course, and had been intrigued, but for many months his work on breaking the Black Organisation had been reaching a crescendo, and KID’s heists had been relegated to a minor note in the back of his brain. The gem wasn’t particularly famous or unique after all – a historical curiosity as part of a noble’s collection, notable for its size, but the crowning piece of that particular exhibit was swords, not a noblewoman’s jewellery. KID’s reparations were likely more than what the gem would have sold for at auction.

“Of course, that was not long before… well, yes, that was bad business,” Hakuba agreed. He looked faintly embarrassed at the memory – he’d admitted to Hattori once, in great reluctance, that he felt a fool for expending such energy on a jewel thief in the wake of the case Conan had cracked. Hattori had been nice about it to his face, apparently, but had crowed a great deal about it to Shinichi ever since. “Regardless, several weeks after that heist, the pattern began to change. Fewer heists of gemstones – fewer heists in  _general_. A three month gap. Then a five month one. There were more copy-cat notices and challenges than true heists.”

Shinichi remembered. “Looking at the pattern, I thought he was trying to give it up. That he found what he wanted and couldn’t let go of the role.”

“That’s the thing,” Hakuba said. “I think he needs it now.”

Shinichi blinked at the underlying meaning. “You agree he needs it?”

Hakuba sighed, settling deeper into his chair. “Conan - I’m sorry, you’re not a child anymore, Edogawa-”

“It’s fine,” Shinichi assured him at the slip in formality. “We’ve known each other that long, don’t start being distant with me now, Hakuba.”

“Yes, well,” he coughed. “We get back to the original point. The reason you came here is because you noticed it, didn’t you?”

So they were finally at the crux of the issue. “That Kaitou KID hasn’t changed at all in the past fifteen years,” Shinichi confirmed.

If it were just his ever-unchanging face, Shinichi likely wouldn’t have thought anything of it. Not everyone aged the same, after all, and Kaitou KID was something of a makeup artist.

Except Conan was now 31 years old, and kept up a strict exercise regime. KID had been at least a good decade older than his reverted body, yet Shinichi had made no gains in catching him. The thief still ran and took corners and did flips like he had in his prime.

Five years ago he’d been impressed. Lately, he’d just become suspicious.

“ _Is_  it the same Kaitou KID?” Shinichi wondered. The voice sounded the same, and what they could see of his face was the same, but the Kaitou KID of his second childhood had the talents to cover up both of those things. It wasn’t unreasonable to believe a successor, much like that Kaitou KID had surely been, could do the same.

“If there had been even the slightest discrepancy, or even some fumbles, I’d be inclined to consider the same,” Hakuba admitted. “It is… far less fantastical. But what are the odds that his successor would take over so smoothly and easily? No rookie mistakes like when KID first returned after his sabbatical, no change in skillset. Same height, same profile. With modern recording techniques those are things we can measure easily.”

They sat in heavy silence. Shinichi had already surmised as much, and his experiences with the Black Organisation’s apoptoxin made the concept less difficult to grasp. That Hakuba had arrived at the same conclusion without that frame of reference reinforced his theory. “I suppose the question then is… how?”

“I suspect only Kaitou KID can answer that, although it again does seem to be linked with the  _Anesidora_ ,” Hakuba offered. “Though it is a mystery I very much want to crack, since becoming Commissioner I have to admit that my priorities have changed somewhat.”

“Of course,” Shinichi said immediately. “Your other responsibilities-”

“Well, yes, there is that,” Hakuba agreed, settling deeper into his chair. He’d put on some small amount of weight in the role – he’d always been bookish, unlike Hattori who filled his spare time with kendo even into his forties – that had rounded his face some, softened his features. “But that wasn’t exactly my meaning. My concerns have shifted more to,  _what do we need to do about it_?”

That gave Shinichi pause.

It was a wisdom he’d picked up as Conan, but even now he often discarded it in the thirst of  _knowing_ , in solving a mystery. It was a wisdom he applied only  _after_  he knew the how, not before – what to do with his deductions, how much to share, how they would affect others.

Hakuba was right, though. The ‘how’ was important, certainly, and something that would bother him endlessly, but it wasn’t the reason he’d come to Aichi seeking an audience.

“I’m… worried about KID,” he said slowly. “And if it is what we think… I don’t know what to do about it, but I think I want to help.”

Hakuba’s grim smile suggested that he’d answered correctly. There was a reason he’d chosen to come to him for counsel, after all, instead of Megure or Nakamori or even Hattori. KID wasn’t just international criminal 1412 to them. To Shinichi, they’d had a gentleman’s agreement. KID had saved his life countless times, and Shinchi had repaid him with what felt like little more than professional favours – looking the other way when KID was vulnerable, or leaving a path open for escape. As for Hakuba, Shinichi didn’t understand their relationship, but he’d detected a similar sense of care that went beyond familiarity and rivalry.

“I don’t know how though, or even where to start,” Shinichi admitted. “I hit a wall. So I came to you for leads.”

Hakuba sat silent for an uncomfortably long moment, then seemed to come to a decision. “I have a story that might interest you,” he said, twirling his wedding ring around his finger thoughtfully. “About a man named Kuroba Kaito.” He held up his hand, displaying the band to Shinichi. “It was due to him that I met my beloved wife.”

Shinichi shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “I’ve met her,” he said. “Nakamori’s daughter, correct? I always assumed you’d met through Nakamori, on one of the KID cases.”

Hakuba’s mouth twisted into a rueful grin. “Your assumption is not entirely wrong, but no, it is definitely due to Kuroba Kaito. He was a childhood friend of my wife’s, you see, and very dear to her. We were classmates, for a time.” His smile vanished, like smoke in the wind. “He disappeared nine years ago without a trace.”

 

………………

 

Shinichi left Hakuba’s office with a binder full of clues and a deeply unsettled feeling in his gut.

What followed was a month of chasing phantom threads, tip toeing through old battlegrounds, the meticulous sort of information collation that had given him fame in his field but which so few cases allowed him to stretch his legs in.

Hakuba’s deductions weren’t the kind he liked – statistical, circumstantial, unproveable, starting with the likeliest suspect and trying to demonstrate their guilt rather than starting with the crime – but without that opening point, he might never have managed.

When he sat there looking at the framework of the story however, Shinichi abruptly realised there was little he could do with it. He couldn’t use it to track KID down. It was a  _weapon_ , perhaps, but one he would have to be extremely careful wielding if he didn’t want to do real damage with it.

What it had done, however, was help him decide exactly what he wanted to do going forward.

His responsibilities with the police force meant Shinichi couldn’t attend every KID heist. Division Two always folded him into the chain of command eagerly when he could, but he expressly didn’t want that this time – he needed to be free to move about, like he had as a child and a teenager. So two more heist notices and three and a half months went by, until finally one arrived with a heist scheduled on his day off.

It was held on the second floor of a hotel – a pop up museum of antique jewellery open for five weeks. Being quite the upper-class establishment hamstrung the taskforce considerably, but for once it worked in Shinichi’s favour as he was able to slip in and out like a guest – a room rented for that very purpose.

The venue was equally ideal for KID’s getaway, however. He could escape into any number of rooms, pose as any guest, and the police wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. The hotel staff wouldn’t tolerate any harassment of their clientele. The taskforce and curators had all accepted that if they couldn’t thwart KID at the gate, the battle would be lost. Shinichi didn’t doubt that some of KID’s wealthier fans – Sonoko likely among them, to the no doubt chagrin of her husband – had rented rooms themselves in the fond hope of a chance meeting and an opportunity to shelter the famous thief.

He kept out of the way until minutes before the heist was due to start, then slipped into the room with the rest of the crowd who were milling about poorly pretending to be interested in the exhibit when they were truly waiting for the thief to show. The police had managed to cordon off the section with the target, at least. It wouldn't be enough.

Shinichi checked his watch. Ten seconds to go.

Right on cue, a blue cloud of smoke burst in the centre of the room with a clap of confetti. No sprinklers or alarm – KID had disabled them, Shinichi noted out of habit. And emerging from the smoke, white suit pristine despite the coating of blue powder in his vicinity, the familiar figure of Kaitou KID.

“My dear audience! How kind of you to come see the show!” He flung his arms wide, ever the performer, like he was greeting old friends.

At this point, he really was.

Shinichi waited for the thief’s gaze to sweep the crowd – searching for detectives. Shinichi didn’t wave, but once he felt KID’s gaze still on him, he made a show of fiddling with his wristwatch.

Hidden within, several hand gestures, ending with three taps on his watch face.

KID tipped his hat – the movement could have been a salute to his fans, but Shinichi was certain he’d been noticed, and that was all that mattered. “Well, I can’t disappoint you, can I? Surrounded by such treasures, it seems only fit I share some of my own!” He pulled off his top hat, and from it flew dozens of white doves, each holding a small bag of glittering jewels in their talons. The crowd shrieked in delight.

But they weren’t carrying jewels, Shinichi realised after a moment. They were carrying  _marbles_.

The doves dropped their bounties, which hit the floor and scattered. In the same breath, the sapphire vanished from its display case, appearing in KID’s white gloved hand. “I’ll be taking this in return, thank you all, you’ve been a wonderful crowd!”

“You’re not getting away that easily KID!” A member of the taskforce called out, moving to rush him before he could escape. Shinichi winced when his foot hit a marble. It exploded beneath his feet into a purple mass of quick-hardening foam. “What- they’re traps!” He hollered in warning.

Shinichi hid a grin. Not even marbles, but  _traps_. KID had laid out a minefield, giving himself a clear escape. Even the most fleet-footed of the taskforce would struggle to follow without setting any off.

There wasn’t anything more to see. He slipped away, heading to the hotel room he’d rented. Room 706 - a luxury studio apartment on the 7th floor with all amenities, everything coloured a gentle beige or a crisp off-white. A glass dining table in the kitchen, a couch in an open living room, a queen bed by the windows. He toed off his shoes at the door, and considered it thoughtfully. He drew the curtains first, then opened all the cupboards to ensure they were empty - paranoid habits he'd never quite broken. Took a minute to splash his face with some water in the bathroom, if only to calm his nerves. Settled on the frankly far too luxurious cream-coloured couch, and waited.

KID’s curiosity would get him to come – that, and the trust they’d built and never totally forgotten through the takedown of the Black Organisation. Neither of them had collaborated  _openly_ , but if Shinichi would let slip some information where he knew KID would overhear sometimes, or where he would wake up to find useful evidence gift-wrapped at the foot of his bed – it was a strong alliance, and one neither of them had ever risked testing in their game of cat and mouse.

Shinichi had once faked falling off a building to trick KID into saving him, but this? This was sacred.

Sure enough, precisely 30 mins after the heist had ended and the taskforce had lost sight of the perpetrator, there was a polite knock at the door. “You ordered room service, sir?”

“Let yourself in,” he replied. The door was locked, but neither room service nor KID required a key.

The waiter let himself in, wheeling a covered tray, and shut the door softly behind himself. “Would you like me to uncork the wine, sir?”

“Yes, I think I need it right now,” Shinichi replied. “Glad you decided to come, KID.”

The waiter gave him a wicked grin, and pulled the white cloak from the trolley, swinging it around his shoulders. By the time the fabric had settled, Kaitou KID stood before him in full regalia once more. “You’re being rather poor sport tonight, tantei-kun,” he remarked. “Didn’t even try to chase.”

Shinichi shrugged. “The setting favoured you too strongly, and this was more important.” He stood up from the couch and made his way over. “I wasn’t kidding about the wine. Join me for a glass?” he invited.

KID fluttered his eyes at him. “My my, tantei-kun. A private room, with only one bed, and bottle of wine? How  _forward_  of you.”

“ _You’re_  the one who brought the wine,” Shinichi retorted, and fetched two glasses from the trolley and waved them at the thief, who dutifully filled them both. Shinichi took a short sniff of it. He wasn’t exactly a connoisseur, but he’d been invited to enough fancy parties over the years to recognise a good wine over a bad one. “Good choice.”

KID clinked glasses with him, though didn’t take a sip yet. Shinichi  _did_ , pointedly – a display of trust – after which the thief followed with a leisurely taste of his own. “Yes well, even then. I’m afraid you’re much too young for me, I’ll have to decline.”

Shinichi tilted his head, considering him thoughtfully. KID was a famous flirt, and it wasn’t the first time he’d turned that Shinichi’s direction in the attempt to get a rise out of the detective. “I don’t know, Kuroba. Lately, I’ve started to wonder if maybe you’re much too young for  _me_.”

KID abruptly went very, very still.

Shinichi took care not to make any sudden moves, simply sipping his drink idly as he slowly made his way back to the couch.

“You’ve been talking to Hakuba,” he eventually said, accusation in his tone.

“Yes,” he replied. “I’m sorry.” He paused and rethought that. “Well, not exactly. I’m sorry for breaking the rules of engagement, but… I think they needed to be broken.”

KID looked betrayed.

It took Shinichi a moment to realise why. He’d anticipated this, and rushed to clarify before the thief could take flight. “This- This side of things-” The  _heist_  side of things. “-It can’t go on much longer. I already miss more than half of your heists, and that number is only going to go up.” Knowing what he knew now, he wished that wasn’t the case, but even then, the most he could hope to do was kick that can down the road a few years.

“And so you thought it finally time to put me behind bars?” KID’s voice had a decided edge to it. He’d put the wine glass on the table, forgotten.

“What? No. I don’t know how that information would help there, considering you’re not exactly using that name.”

“Then… is this goodbye?” The edge had gained a sliver of panic, now, and Shinichi took careful note of it. KID didn’t tend to keep his poker face as religiously around him, but experience had shown him that any sliver of emotion was often many magnitudes higher than what the hint of it implied.

“No! I just… KID, you’re not aging.”

The silence this time stretched an eternity. KID’s smile was thin, but he didn’t deny it. “…I suppose I couldn’t fool  _you_ forever, considering.”

Shinichi shrugged it off, grateful that at least the thief wasn’t going to fight him on it, or take off with some sleeping gas never to be seen again. “The apoptoxin made me consider it sooner, yes. And you’re not the first ageless person I’ve met.” They never had caught Vermouth. Shinichi didn’t know how he felt about that, anymore. “Since the  _Anesidora_ , wasn’t it?”

KID’s only answer was to abruptly swig his entire glass of wine, and pour a second. He tilted the bottle at Shinichi, who solemnly held out his own glass for a refill. “And what of it,  _meitantei_?”

“Does anyone know?  _Anyone_?”

Here, in this hotel room, without shadows to hide behind, he looked so  _young_. Intellectually, Shinichi knew they were the same age – knew Kuroba was in his forties – but he had the same lost, startled expression he’d seen on junior detectives out of their depth, on their first day of the job. It was the same feeling he got when he graduated high school and looked back at the students only a few years under him and could barely imagine still being that small.

“My mother…” KID began haltingly.

Kuroba Chikage, passed away five years prior after a short battle with cancer caught too late. He’d found her story in one of the countless threads he’d pulled trying to make sense of the missing person case Hakuba had handed him. “Anyone  _alive_?”

KID just stared at him with a lost expression. “…What do you  _want_ , tantei-kun?”

“I want to help,” Shinichi said. “I want to meet Kuroba Kaito.”

He let the silence sit that time – let it settle between them, giving the thief all the time he needed to think. This was why he’d chosen this setting to have this conversation, instead of throwing it on the rooftop in the middle of a getaway. Guaranteed privacy and no risk of interruption, and an easy escape for KID if he required it.

When KID finally answered, his voice was so soft he had to strain his ears to hear it. “I… haven’t been Kuroba Kaito for a very long time,” he admitted.

Shinichi nodded. “Nine years, right?”

KID drained the second glass of wine, but didn’t pour another. “I must confess tantei-kun, I don’t really see the point. Why do you want to meet someone who doesn’t exist anymore?”

“I know what it’s like, KID. I’m  _Edogawa Conan_ , remember? Don’t try to tell me that isn’t worth something.”

This was the one thing that let Shinichi think he could help, where Hakuba couldn’t.  _Reciprocity_.

Shinichi had Haibara still, at least, and Hattori, and his parents, along with a handful of others in the know in general if not filled in on the particulars. Even that felt crushing in the dead of the night sometimes, like he really had died and the rest of him hadn’t caught the memo yet. Where he would lay awake reciting facts about his original identity – because really, Edogawa Conan wasn’t even much of a lie anymore – just to reassure himself that he hadn’t forgotten.

There was value there. To have someone –  _anyone_  – know him as a complete person, rather than simply a collection of people who all had different fragments.

“…I suppose you do know,” KID muttered. “But considering you’ve ah, got over your  _little problem_  in the longform way, it doesn’t solve much for me, does it?”

“I’m ten years closer than anyone else,” Shinichi pointed out.

“And even  _you_  will leave me behind eventually.”

“Maybe, maybe not. Maybe together, we can find a solution,” Shinichi said. “But even if we don’t… isn’t it worth a few decades at least, where someone  _knows_?”

KID didn’t respond, but he didn’t need to. Shinichi could already see it, in his whole posture.

KID had maybe been even worse off than either he or Hakuba had guessed.

Shinichi knew better than to press it, knew how easily a yes could turn into a no. He turned to stare at the window – the view hidden by curtains, but the message would be clear to the thief. “There’s a chocolate café in Shinagawa, mostly serves business customers, has a daffodil on the sign. 2pm, tomorrow,” he offered. “It’s quiet there. Private.” Far away from both Ekoda and Beika and anyone who might recognise either of them.

When he turned back around, both the trolley and thief were gone.

 

………………

 

The café was quiet when Shinichi arrived. He chose a private booth, directly under a speaker playing gentle lounge jazz, and nursed a single cup of coffee until it grew cold. He’d arrived thirty minutes early, the lingering remnants of the morning’s case still swirling in his thoughts. He’d been anxious to finish it quickly – this wasn’t an appointment he could afford to miss, but luckily most criminals he faced on a day to day basis were abject morons.

He was pulled from his thoughts by the sound of a clearing throat next to him. Shinichi startled from his contemplation of his coffee, and looked up to the sight of what was nearly himself, nine years prior, if the eyes were a slightly different shade of blue.

“Mind if I join you?” he asked, and Shinichi had never seen anyone look quite so uncomfortable in their own skin.

“Take a seat,” he offered by rote.

He slid in across from him, the movements easy and graceful. “Kuroba Kaito.” He held out a hand. Shinichi pretended he didn’t notice the faint quiver in the magician’s fingers when he grasped it.

“Shinichi Kudo,” he replied, voice warm, and if it shook a little on the unfamiliar words, neither of them would admit it. “Nice to meet you.”

 

 


End file.
